Enhanced Sound Localization

A new approach to sound localization, known as enhanced sound localization, is introduced, offering two major benefits over state-of-the-art algorithms. First, higher localization accuracy can be achieved compared to existing methods. Second, an estimate of the source orientation is obtained jointly, as a consequence of the proposed sound localization technique. The orientation estimates and improved localizations are a result of explicitly modeling the various factors that affect a microphone's level of access to different spatial positions and orientations in an acoustic environment. Three primary factors are accounted for, namely the source directivity, microphone directivity, and source-microphone distances. Using this model of the acoustic environment, several different enhanced sound localization algorithms are derived. Experiments are carried out in a real environment whose reverberation time is 0.1 seconds, with the average microphone SNR ranging between 10-20 dB. Using a 24-element microphone array, a weighted version of the SRP-PHAT algorithm is found to give an average localization error of 13.7 cm with 3.7% anomalies, compared to 14.7 cm and 7.8% anomalies with the standard SRP-PHAT technique.